Prospective acceptability of digital therapy for major depressive disorder in France: multicentric real-life study.

BACKGROUND:Major depressive disorder is one of the leading causes of disability worldwide. Recently, the WHO has highlighted the negative impact of recent crises (COVID-19 pandemic, war in Ukraine, economic crisis). Although most international guidelines recommend psychological and psychosocial interventions as a first-line treatment for mild to moderate depression, access remains limited in France due to limited availability of trained clinicians, high costs for patients in a context of non-reimbursement and fear of stigmatisation. Therefore, online blended psychological treatment such as deprexis® could improve access to care for people with depression. It has several advantages such as easy access, scalability and is supported by evidence. OBJECTIVE:This study aims to evaluate the real-life acceptability of a deprexis® for people with depression in France, outside of a reimbursement pathway. METHODS:DARE was designed as a multicentre cross-sectional study in which deprexis® was offered to any patient meeting the inclusion criteria during the fixed inclusion period June 2022-March 2023. Inclusion criteria were: 1/ depression, 2/ age between 18 and 65 years, 3/ sufficient French language skills, 4/ access to internet with a device to connect to the deprexis® platform. Exclusion criteria were previous or current diagnosis of bipolar disorder, psychotic symptoms and/or suicidal thoughts during the current episode. The primary objective is to measure the prospective acceptability of deprexis®, a new digital therapy. Secondary objectives are to examine differences in acceptability according to patient and clinician characteristics and to identify reasons for refusal. All investigators received video-based training on deprexis® prior to enrolment to ensure that they all had the same level of information and understanding of the programme. RESULTS:245 patients were eligible (56.3% women and 56.3% single). Mean age 40.7+-14.1 years. 78% had moderate to severe depression (according to PHQ-9). More than half of the population had another psychiatric comorbidity (excluding bipolar disorder, psychotic disorders and suicidal ideation). 33.9% of patients accepted the idea of using deprexis® and the main reason for refusal was financial, at 83.3%. Multivariate logistic regression identified factors that might favour acceptability of deprexis®. Among these, being in a couple, being treated with an antidepressant or having a low severity level favoured acceptance of deprexis®. CONCLUSIONS:DARE is the first French study aiming at evaluating prospective acceptability of a Digital therapy in the treatment of depression. The main reason for refusal of deprexis® was financial. DARE will allow a better identification of factors influencing it in a natural setting. This study highlights the importance of investigating factors that may be associated with the acceptability of digital interventions, such as marital status, medication use and severity of depression. CLINICALTRIAL: